


Haunt You Every Day

by Eligh



Category: Grimm (TV)
Genre: Character Study, F/M, M/M, Past Relationship(s)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-04
Updated: 2012-07-04
Packaged: 2017-11-09 03:32:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,037
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/450773
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Eligh/pseuds/Eligh
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Angelina was Monroe's everything... until he met Nick.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Haunt You Every Day

Monroe’d known her most of his life, of course—their families lived near enough to each other that they’d gather (along with the other blutbaden that made the area their home) once or twice a year—large, family-style dinners in the winter, and long camping vacations in the summer.

The summer was the best. The pups were out of school, the weather was warm, the prey was plentiful, and they’d congregate for weeks in some backwoods camping spot, always by a lake or a river. It was almost like a family reunion, out in the forest with two dozen or so blutbaden, camping, hunting, letting themselves be who they were meant to be.

The first year he met her, Monroe was six and she was five. He and his brothers at first only uncertainly accepted this female pup into their play—she was smaller than both them and her own brothers, obviously, and Monroe’s twin brother James had complained that he didn’t want to have to be careful playing around a _girl_. But Rolf had vouched for her, and being the oldest, his word was accepted.

It turned out to be a good decision—that first summer together proved more exciting than anything Monroe had experienced so far in his short life. Angelina quickly proved to be smart and fast, could hold her own in a fight, came up with the best games, and was the hardest to hunt. They only needed a few days together before Angelina was firmly part of their pack.

Every summer they romped together, an inseparable gang of wild pups. Their numbers fluxuated slightly over the years, but Monroe, Angelina, and their respective brothers were constants for at least ten youthful summers. No one ever again thought to mention that Angelina was a _girl_ —it was obvious and yet not. Besides, they were still young enough that none of those sort of things mattered.

Monroe might have seen his future coming once when he was twelve and she showed up in a daisy-patterned sundress, her hair catching all the red light of the summer sun. He had felt something catch in his throat then, really seeing her for the first time, but it was gone quickly. Twenty minutes after her family had pulled up, she was in jeans and just as mud-covered as the rest of them. Monroe didn’t think about it again all summer.

As they got older and entered high school, Monroe didn’t attend the summer gatherings as often. He was already little odd in the grand scheme of the Pack—he’d been taking extra classes in an effort to graduate early and had even mentioned wanting to go to college. At sixteen, he already had his applications in at half a dozen schools and was filling others out for half a dozen more.

But his seventeenth summer, after the whole debacle with Molly and Monroe’s resulting capitulation to his instincts, (his parents had been so proud—with his studious and reserved nature, they’d been beginning to despair that he would ever be a _proper_ blutbad) James finally convinced him to come with them again. _And this time_ , he’d said, _we’re old enough to go off on our own. We’ll have a wild time_. Monroe agreed, remembering just how _good_ it felt to be wild.

They ended up camping at a site about a mile away from the main pack, and for a couple days, Monroe watched from the sidelines as his childhood friends laughed and drank and smoked. It was fun, sure, but nothing special, there was nothing _extraordinary_ to convince him that this could be a better life.

But then, Angelina. Three days after he’d arrived she appeared, a whirlwind of energy and power and Monroe could barely make the connection in his mind that this was _Angelina_ , who had been one of the guys and who now simply was _not_ , not any longer. Now she was sixteen and beautiful with red hair and cruel lips and after only a few hours with her, he realized that he’d never wanted so badly in all his life.

She had a boyfriend, some deadbeat from the next town over that Monroe vaguely remembered from years past—Sam. And you didn’t fight over women (blutbaden weren’t barbarians and women aren’t property) but that didn’t stop Monroe from watching, wishing he’d have an opportunity to kick the shit out of the swaggering asshole.

Of course he got his chance—Sam was cocky and decided that quiet, book-smart Monroe would be an easy target. Monroe had ripped a five-inch gash in the kid’s face and nearly taken off an ear before Sam realized Monroe had even moved, and after, when Monroe snarled and blood dripped from his claws, Angelina’d given him a long, appraising look. Monroe had smiled sharply and she had licked her lips.

It had only been a matter of time after that. She appeared in his bedroom one night a few weeks later, promising wonderful, intoxicating things, and Monroe had closed his textbooks and gone running, chasing her by the light of a half-full moon. He hadn’t looked back.

She was everything. He stopped going to school, only taking the test to get his GED as an afterthought when his parents complained that he should at least get his diploma. College was of course forgotten, not that that was too unusual in the circles he was running in now. Monroe alternated his time now between running with Angelina at night and picking up odd jobs doing farm work or construction during the day. So what if it wasn’t what he’d pictured his life to be? He had her.

The first time they hunted live prey, Monroe was eighteen and thought he might just die from happiness.

It was an elk, first. Angelina’d wanted a girl from the next town over, but Monroe had a rare moment of sanity and had suggested a less-sentient practice run, something they could kill and eat without the threat of torches and pitchforks. Reluctantly, Angelina had agreed, but only after Monroe had promised to ask the local pack leaders about more specifics on how to Not Get Caught.

But the elk. It had been beautiful and fast and had given them a run, a merry chase—but they’d caught it eventually and killed it with their teeth and howled at the moon. And after their bellies were full, they gave into the bloodlust and Monroe had knotted her for the first time ever and it was _wonderful_ and so right and he’d whispered _my mate_ in her ear and she’d kissed him, tearing at his lips and lapping at his blood. It was the best night of Monroe’s life.

Of course after they received the go-ahead from the pack, they’d stepped the hunt up and for months, almost a year, there were odd disappearances from the nearby towns. Every few weeks Monroe and Angelina would disappear for a night or two and come back blood-smeared and sated, would lounge around their tiny apartment and make veiled comments to their hangers-on (because somehow they’d become the baddest couple around and they had _groupies_ now, to Monroe’s infinite delight).

He’d been with Angelina for two years when the pack leaders invited him to a meeting. And this boy—whose plan originally had been college and then a quiet life spent alone—smiled his sharp and now-practiced smile and flexed his claws and shouldered the mantle of responsibility. The pack leaders liked him, and though he was too young yet to be anyone with real power, they listened. The word ‘alpha’ was whispered behind his back. Monroe just smiled and silently thanked Angelina for letting him be what he could be.

But good things never last, and in this case, (as is often the case with blutbaden packs) the end was explosive.

The growing frequency of disappearances attracted a Grimm—and they should have seen it, but there were less of the hunters around now. In fact, there hadn’t been one since Monroe’s grandparents’ time and well… the pack was caught off guard.

Monroe hadn’t been at the meeting the Grimm had ambushed, but he was the one who found them. He walked in, still high from his latest run with Angelina, not noticing the curious lack of scent that should have screamed _wolfsbane,_ to all six of the pack leaders, headless, bodies strewn around the living room of the alpha’s house. He hadn’t been sick—no, he was far too used to the sight and smell of blood to throw up—but he had been terrified, horrified at what the blood looked like from this side, when it was _his_ friends who were murdered. Still, he’d been lucky.

Over the next month, others in the pack weren’t. His family fled when the neighbors had also shown up dead, cutting ties and running. Monroe didn’t follow—right now he was the de facto leader and _couldn’t_ , not that he would leave Angelina in any case. He and Angelina tried to make an effort to catch the Grimm, but it was too good—they never even came close. It was too much for some nineteen year old kid, really, but Monroe still tried. Failure followed failure and months dragged by as he watched his pack splinter helplessly.

But then.

One night, while walking home from the latest Grimm-induced bloodbath (the last bloodbath, though he didn’t know it at the time) he was attacked, a sharp blow to the side of his head that left him reeling, a hard jab to his back that made him fall to the ground.

_I should kill you_ , the Grimm told him, _but I won’t, because I researched you, Monroe. And you’re better than this. You’re smart. You shouldn’t be here._ Monroe felt the ice-cold blade of an axe against his throat and shivered, suddenly realizing that he wanted to _live_ , wanted to grow old, and there was no chance of him doing so, not if he kept going the way he was going.

So he listened while the Grimm talked to him. Listened when he was told that his pack was done. The Grimm said that he would come back if anything ever happened again. Said he’d be watching. Monroe understood.

The worst part after all of that was talking to Angelina (and that was saying something—Monroe had never figured on something worse than having an axe to the throat). He tried, he really did try—he talked about his life before her, about not giving in to instincts, about how they would die, how they had a target on their backs. She didn’t care, didn’t want to—maybe couldn’t—change. It hurt. Hurt in more ways than one, really, and he limped away from their apartment, bloody and broken.

It would be a lie to say he didn’t look back.

Monroe reapplied to colleges and ruthlessly tamped down on his memories of blood and chase and hunt. He traded in his leather jacket for a cashmere sweater, his ripped jeans and steel-toed boots for corduroys and loafers. In day to day life, he avoided gatherings of more than a couple people, kept his nose deep in his books and studied, studied, studied. It was three years before he shook the feeling that he was being watched. But the entire time, he dreamed.

Her smile, her wicked _smile_ , her hair, her legs, her stomach, her hands, her claws, _her._

And when she showed up his senior year at Brown, it was almost a given that he’d relapse. He’d been barely hanging on anyway, stressed from being around so many people all the time, from the smells and the temptation and so when she asked, when she teased, he ran right into her arms.

They hunted a deer in a Pennsylvania forest and it felt so like the first time that it was almost his undoing. They fucked smeared in blood, and Monroe lost himself to want and need and _Angelina_ and her soft breast in his hand, her sharp teeth on his lips, her warm body so inviting and enticing, and he knotted her again, falling further, faster than ever before.

But this time, she didn’t bother to stay. But Monroe knew that if she’d asked, he would have followed, and so despite the rending pain of waking up alone, he was thankful. He washed himself of blood and slunk home, metaphorical tail tucked, and finished his semester, graduated with honors now that he had his lust sated and could concentrate on essays and presentations and books.

It felt a little fake.

He worked for a year and half at a music store after graduation and much to his surprise, found he had a natural talent for the strings. He eventually picked cello, enjoying the deep resonance of the instrument, how the heavy wood felt in his hands. His boss—a wildermann named Leonard—liked him, gave him private lessons for free, and Monroe flourished. He went for whole days without thinking about Angelina.

When he finally quit the store, his boss sold him his old cello with a smile, told Monroe not to be a stranger. He’d been the one pushing for Monroe to go to grad school, and had helped him develop a routine that kept Monroe sane and blood-free. Len understood—his past wasn’t exactly violence-free, either, and Monroe was grateful.

They stayed close and Monroe ended up studying at the store a lot. And after a while of subtle touches, and for a few months before he got his degree, the cello lessons moved from the store to Len’s apartment, and then to Len’s bed. It was nice, if not mind-blowing, and once Monroe even went a whole week without Angelina intruding on his thoughts.

Len could never have been his world like Angelina had been, though, and when Monroe decided to move to Oregon, they’d parted amicably. Len made Monroe promise to keep up with his routine and not to quit the cello, and even gave him an antique cuckoo clock as a parting gift, having noticed Monroe’s new hobby of clock-fiddling, as he called it.

In Oregon, Monroe found work first at a temp agency doing construction, (fat lot of good his Master’s in European Literature was doing for him) then at another music store (this one he quit after only a couple months, as he was too annoyed to deal with _people_ all the damn time) and finally at a run-down antique store where he quickly rose to manager and started making decent money. The store was nice—he could indulge his clock tinkering, and it was here that he met his first wesen in the city, a klaustreich of all things.

The woman—Suzie—put a name to the control he was trying to assert over himself, and for the first time, Monroe called himself a wieder-blutbad. Guided by Suzie, he started going to meetings, found the bar, made a few acquaintances. As time passed, he thought about Angelina less and less. It was easier, now. A new state, new people, nothing really to remind him of her. It was all right.

After a couple years of study, he was able to quit the antique shop and work full time repairing clocks. He wasn’t quite good enough to make his own, not yet, but he was well on his way. It helped that when he wasn’t working on clocks, he didn’t do much besides read and play his cello. He didn’t go out much, still finding it too hard to control all his instincts, all the time.

There were, of course, a couple times that he wolfed out at the sight of red, at the urge to chase and catch, but he was able to rein it in. Every single time, he thought of Angelina, then buried his memories of her just as ruthlessly as he buried the rest of his instincts.

Monroe got used to being lonely. His acquaintances were just that—he didn’t have any close friends, not really. Suzie moved on, and so did a couple of the guys at the bar. And sure, there was a small group of wieder wesen that he could talk to, but he didn’t really try to get close. It felt too much like _pack_ sometimes, and Monroe didn’t need that. He was fine as a lone wolf.

Eventually, he was able to buy a house. It was nice, right on the edge of Forest Park, and for the first time in a long while he didn’t feel claustrophobic. He was rather proud of himself when a week after moving in, he realized he hadn’t chosen the place with the thought of _would she like it?_ in the back of his mind. He ordered a stained glass wolf windowpane to go in the front door, and the place started to feel like home.

A few years passed, and Monroe settled deeply into his routine. Pilates, yoga, meditation, cello. He developed a taste for locally brewed beer and taught himself to cook. One day a week, he allowed himself to go out—he’d go shopping, pick up any supplies for his clocks he couldn’t order online, go visit the regulars at the bar. Sometimes he’d go watch the daemonfeuers dance, but only if he’d been having an especially good week, control-wise.

He’d almost forgotten what blood tasted like, what it felt like to run under the moon.

The week he met his second Grimm had been a bad one from the start. He’d spent three days arguing—first on the phone and then in person—with a particularly infuriating client, had irreparably broken a clock he’d been working on for six months, burned two meals, and that very morning had fallen out of bed, smashing his back in an effort to escape a nightmare that came with swinging axes. So it was entirely expected that he would wolf out at a kid in red riding past—and it wasn’t like he’d even thought anything of it, just had a momentary _rar_ moment. It happened to the best of us.

But then the fucking Grimm. And he’d been tackled and scared just about shitless because Grimms weren’t even supposed to be a _thing_ anymore, and here he was having met _two_ , and he kinda hated his life right then. He watched the Grimm (who was a cop, too, and shouldn’t that be illegal?) and his partner toss his house and didn’t even think once about the delicate shit they might be breaking, the barbarians. Instead, he thought about Angelina, and how she wouldn’t be sitting in the back of a cop car. She would have ripped that Grimm’s pretty head right off his shoulders.

That night, when the Grimm came snooping, he almost did it. He jumped through the window, and felt the surge of adrenaline and remembered the hunt and let his claws out to tear—but then he looked down at his prey and saw shocked (and a little scared) blue eyes staring up at him, and he backed off without even really thinking about it. So Monroe invited a freaking _Grimm_ in for a beer, and tried not to think about what Angelina would have said.

Turned out that the guy was just coming into his Grimm powers and had absolutely no idea what was going on. It was a little ridiculous, because what kind of person sees a guy shift his face into a wolf and then comes back at night to snoop? A crazy one, apparently, but Monroe found it more amusing than scary. And for some reason, when the Grimm asked him if he’d ever known anyone else like him, Monroe had lied and hadn’t said a word about his past. Instead, he told the Grimm that his kind were like legends—fearsome monsters for children and not really believed in as adults.

He couldn’t tell you why he said that—god knows he’d had enough hands-on experience with a Grimm to last him a lifetime, but he didn’t want to traumatize the guy. And when the Grimm left later, still miraculously un-mauled, Monroe had sat at his kitchen table to think. _Nick_ , he said to himself. The name didn’t taste too bad on his lips.

So he started helping. And sure, it was reluctantly at first (especially the clusterfuck that was guarding Nick’s dying Grimm aunt) but he was interested despite himself and Nick became a somewhat routine visitor in his life. Granted, Nick messed up his schedule and was generally infuriating and clueless, but he was also determined and had surprising hidden strength. Monroe supposed he wouldn’t be a very good Grimm without that.

The weirdest thing was the no-killing-unless-I-have-to mentality. Several times, Monroe almost exploded and yelled, _killing’s what you do, it’s who you are_ , but Nick was so certain in his convictions that he could talk it out that Monroe started feeling some of his certainty by proxy. So yea, it was weird. But it worked, and Monroe didn’t really feel the need to protest against the lack of beheadings.

Wrapped up as he was in the novelty of Nick, Monroe was entirely blindsided when whose house got blown to bits but Hap’s. And Hap meant Angelina and yea, she showed up, right on schedule, spitting mad and screaming for blood and the ache that had mostly quit throbbing in Monroe’s chest started right back up.

He told himself he wasn’t going to give in this time, that he was _better_ than this, that he had the willpower. But then she _looked_ at him and let him smell her and touched him, and it was over. He was running in the forest before he knew what was happening and there was blood in his mouth and his woman in his hands.

And then Hap was dead. Another death, and it was his fault, _again_. If he’d just said no to her, but he could never say no, she _owned_ him in all the wrong ways. God but he hated himself. And he deserved it when he saw the betrayal and disgust in Nick’s eyes, too.

He almost went with her, this time. She offered. And he could have taken it, run with her to Louisiana, lost himself in everything that she represented again. But he didn’t, and for months after, he didn’t know why.

He thought about her constantly again—his obsessing was almost as bad as the first time he left. He dreamed about her, fantasized about her, imagined what she was doing at this very moment. He wondered if she thought about him. He doubted it.

Slowly, so unbearably, achingly slowly, the thud of missing her started to fade. He readjusted, cemented himself further into his routines, forced himself to step back into reality. Nick, almost surprisingly, helped. Monroe had thought he’d lost him, lost the burgeoning friendship with the baby Grimm, but Nick was apparently willing to let bygones be bygones. Monroe knew that Nick wasn’t aware of what a blessing he was—the perfect distracter for a grieving wolf—and he was fine with that. The more Nick dragged him out on cases, the less he thought about Angelina. So he grumped and Nick wheedled and their friendship became more real.

Monroe was there when the whole Adalind/Juliette horror happened, a comforting (and ruthlessly vengeful) presence by Nick’s side, and he only briefly wondered why he was so willing to do anything to help a Grimm. _It’s Nick_ was all the rationalization he apparently needed, and after, when Nick took up permanent residence on his couch, unable to force himself to go back to what had been his and Juliette’s house, Monroe didn’t even blink.

Sometimes he wondered what Angelina would think of a blutbad’s only natural enemy sleeping helpless in his living room. Honestly, she’d probably call him an idiot and try to kill Nick in the night. And with this thought circling the back of his mind, for the first time in his whole life, Monroe’s attitude toward Angelina shifted slightly.

One night, as Nick sat picking listlessly at his salad, Monroe had told him. Said that he was sorry about the way he’d acted when Angelina was in town, how he’d never explained what she was to him, how fucked up all that was. How he appreciated Nick sticking by him, after. How he thought that now, finally, he might be able to put her behind him. Nick had looked at him like he had lost his mind, said he didn’t need to explain himself. Nick understood being crazy for a woman. Had looked down at his salad and said hell, he understood being crazy for a man.

They didn’t talk about it again after that.

 A year passed. Nick sold his house and Monroe cleaned out the spare bedroom, making the oddest roommate situation in the history of roommates official. But it was safer like this—they protected each other, looked out for each other. Nick’s cop partner wasn’t thrilled about their living situation, but his captain seemed pleased for reasons neither of them could understand. Sometimes, to Monroe’s utter terror, Nick’s mother dropped by in an effort to get Nick to talk to her. Unable to reconcile years of grieving at her faked death, combined with her utter lack of empathy during the Juliette situation, Nick entirely refused. Monroe couldn’t say he blamed him.

For awhile, things were quiet. Nick did his cop/Grimm thing and Monroe did his clockmaker/reformed blutbad thing, and life started to smooth out. Sure, shit sometimes got dangerous, but they were _good_ , an excellent team, and they usually came out ahead.

And then, like a plague, she came back.

Monroe came home from a client meeting to find an unconscious Nick tied to his kitchen table and Angelina hovering over him, her knife sharp and ready. _Play with me again_ , she said. _Just like the first time_ , she said.

When everything was said and done, a slightly worse-for-wear Angelina was the one handcuffed in the back of a cop car and Monroe was sitting on the bumper of the ambulance, next to Nick. He didn’t even look over as the cops drove away, instead concentrating on holding an icepack to Nick’s head.

~

“That’s when I knew.” Monroe looked down at Nick, who was caged in between his arms. “You meant more to me than she did, and no one’s ever meant more to me than she did.”

Nick stared up at him from his position sprawled in the direct center of Monroe’s bed. “Good thing it only took you two years to act on it after that,” he said after a moment of silence. Monroe rolled his eyes.

“Here I am, baring my _soul_ , and you respond with sarcasm.” He affected a rather convincing glower, but Nick only grinned.

“You know you love it.” Nick lifted his head and kissed Monroe’s shoulder, then rolled over, pinning Monroe under him. “Why didn’t you tell me about the other Grimm before now?”

Monroe glanced away. “Are you serious? You think it’s easy admitting I’ve killed people to a cop? And I couldn’t tell you about the Grimm without telling you that.”

Nick sobered. “You know I won’t… I don’t…”

“I know.” Monroe reached up and ran his hand through Nick’s hair. “Trust goes both ways.”

Nick’s gaze on him was warm, and Monroe tried on a small smile. Nick smiled back, then leaned down and kissed him, less frantic now that they’d had a few days to get used to one another like this, now that it was clear neither was going to run screaming for the hills. When they separated, Nick rolled off Monroe and back onto the center of the bed, stretching.

“I love you too, you know,” he commented almost idly. “But I didn’t have some defining eureka moment.”

Monroe hummed inquiringly and wrapped himself around Nick, sliding an arm under his head, throwing a leg over his thighs, letting his fingers trace the thin line of hair under his bellybutton. He nosed the hair behind Nick’s ear and inhaled deeply. “You smell good,” he mumbled.

Nick turned his head. “Here I am, baring my _soul_ , and you’re sniffing me,” he joked, but when Monroe met his eyes, he looked almost nervous.

With a smile, Monroe pulled him closer. “I’m listening.” 

Nick gazed at the ceiling for a moment before turning back to him. “I’ve had a… I don’t know. Almost inappropriate appreciation for you from the beginning. You’re gorgeous, you know.” He picked up Monroe’s free hand and ran his fingers over his knuckles. “Something about you…” Nick glanced at Monroe, who was now smirking in a very self-satisfied manner, and flicked him gently on the shoulder.

“Shut up.” Monroe gave him an I-didn’t-say-anything look, and Nick smiled again, laced their fingers together. “I realized I was more invested than I should be when those Löwen kidnapped you. I wouldn’t fight to the death for just anybody.”

“Have I mentioned how endlessly thankful I was when you did that?” Monroe murmured, and leaned forward slightly, brushing his lips over Nick’s cheek.

“A couple times,” Nick replied with his own smirk. He refocused. “But other than that, it’s just been a slow build to it. I guess a year or so ago I woke up and realized that I loved you, but it wasn’t a new revelation. It was like a, ‘obviously I do’ moment.”

Monroe nodded, serious. “We’re horribly unromantic, aren’t we.” He freed his hand and let it drift downward again, exploring a little lower than he had a few minutes ago. He was pleased to find Nick more than interested.

Nick sucked in a breath and spread his legs. “I think we’re just fine, we’re…” He closed his eyes. “Yea, this is, this is perfect.”

“Mmm,” Monroe agreed, licking his lips before he kissed Nick’s neck. He concentrated, enjoying the noises Nick made underneath him, all thoughts of Angelina and his past already pushed to the back of his mind, half-forgotten.

He thought this was prefect, too. 

**Author's Note:**

> So my random postulations on relationships are probably (likely) going to be completely shot to hell once August and the new season rolls around, but meh. 
> 
> Also, I apparently really like writing future fic.


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